Category Archives: Lesson/Game/Activity

Each color team finds the panels of the parachute that matches their color teams: Red, Blue, Yellow, Green

Roll the parachute under their fingers and grip firmly. No need to use the handles. This will spread the kids out and give you a simple way to move groups of kids by saying, “Those of you holding a (chose a color) panel, go under the parachute and find a different panel”.

Ocean Waves: Shake the chute

Grip: Roll the chute under your fingers for a firm grip.

Big Waves: Students make big waves by shaking the chute.

Add balls and try to bounce them off

Color Panel Run: (Color Panel style)

Grip: Roll the chute under your fingers for a firm grip.

Cue: Shoe tops, Lift up as high as you can, pull back…

Leader calls out one of the four colors and the people holding that panel run underneath to the other side and take a different panel of the same color.

Keep calling out colors until everyone completes a turn.

Dome (Igloo)

Grip: Roll the chute under your fingers for a firm grip.

Cue: Shoe tops, Lift up as high as you can, pull back…

When the teacher sees that the chute is high and pulled back well:

Teacher says, “Go under and immediately sit inside the chute, while keeping the chute stretched out tight”.

Once inside, the teacher can let the class scoot forward and the chute will get taller.

Optional Panel color exchange: When the teacher calls out a color, people sitting on that color can get up in the middle and exchange places with other people with the same color.

Climb the Bubble (Color panel style)

Teacher says, “Shoe tops, 1,2,3, lift up as high as you can, pull back..

SNAP the parachute down

Put their knees on top on the outside of the chute (You should have a giant bubble in the middle).

Teacher calls color teams one at a time and says to “Climb the bubble!” All of the students from that color team crawl on top of the chute until the bubble is deflated. Then they hurry back to the outside, so every color team has a turn.

You will have to inflate the parachute again each time.

Merry Go Round Color Panel Run: (Color Panel style)

Everyone hold the panels with your left hand on your color panel.

Start walking (skipping?) and stretch the chute out

Call out a color, ie. “RED”

When their color is called, they let go of the parachute and run forward (the same way the chute is moving) and step into the next available color panel.

Continue walking and calling out the four different color until everyone has had a chance to move.

Shark Attack Spark Style:

Class stands holding the parachute waist high. Make ocean waves by moving the parachute up and down.

Chose one panel color to be the sharks. They go under the chute and place their hands above their head to simulate a shark’s fin above the water.

Shark should slide step or do the grapevine near the rim of the parachute for one lap before they begin swimming and moving back and forth and underneath the parachute. They should be cruising around and looking for ankles to bite.

On the teacher’s signal, “Bite” The sharks grab the ankles of someone who is standing while holding the parachute. The sharks take their place and the bitten people become sharks. Once you’ve been bitten you are immune from a being attacked by a shark until everyone has had a turn.

Continue until everyone has a turn being a shark.

Traditional Shark Attack:

Class sits with legs underneath parachute.

One panel color will be the lifeguards. They will stay outside of the parachute and try save

students that get pulled under by the sharks.

Another panel color will be the sharks under the parachute. Give each shark a frisbee to

hold above their head under the chute.

When someone is pulled under the parachute by the shark, they will exchange the frisbee

to the new shark.

The “old shark” will replace the person they pulled under on the outside of the chute.

Additional Activities:

Picture Perfect: Start the same as igloo, but cover your head, so you can see everyone’s face while under the parachute.

Mushroom: Start the same as igloo, but this time everyone step forward and walk forward so the the parachute rises in the air.

The balloon must not be held, only balanced, and it must not be tapped.

The finger must be in direct contact with the balloon at all times.

Balloon Juggle

Each team (6-8 per team) is given one balloon each with two additional ones.

They are to try and keep all of the balloons in the air.

Even more balloons may be added to increase the challenge.

Balloon Juggle Memory Game

Each team (6-8 per team) decide on the order by calling out the name of someone in their group (it’s best if it is not passed to the person next to them)

Balloons may be added to increase the challenge.

Balloon Partner Volleyball

Inflate to medium or medium-low pressure, so the balloon “floats” only a bit but not too much.

Stand facing a partner across a line on the floor of the gym.

One person serves the balloon by throwing the balloon in the air and hitting it with an open hand across the line. Try to use volleyball techniques, such as the pass, set, kill, or serve to hit the balloon back and forth across the line

If someone allows the balloon to touch the floor on their side, the person on the other side of the net scores a point.

Play first person to 5 points, and then start again.

You are allowed to touch the balloon more than once on your side.

Balloon Tennis Skills (Use foam paddles or badminton rackets)

Each person in class has a paddle or racket and a balloon. Start at your individual gym home space.

Can you?

Starting with the balloon in front of you, can you tap the balloon with an underhand motion without moving your feet. How many taps.

Now put the balloon above your head and try tapping the balloon straight up.

Forehand, backhand,

Balloon Tennis Game

Stand facing a partner across a line on the floor of the gym.

One person serves the balloon by throwing the balloon in the air and tapping it with the racket. Try to use tennis techniques, such as the forehand, backhand, and serve.

If someone allows the balloon to touch the floor on their side, the person on the other side of the net scores a point.

Play first person to 5 points, and then start again.

You are allowed to touch the balloon more than once on your side.

Balloon Over/Under Relay

The object of this game is to get your team to the opposite end of the gym by passing a balloon.

Teams line up in relay team formation.

The balloon is passed overhead to the person in back of them.

That person now passes the balloon through their legs to the next person who leans down and picks it up then passes it overhead to the person standing in back of them.

When the last pass is made that person runs to the front of the line and passes the balloon overhead and the pattern continues.

The team will eventually move their whole team to the opposite end of the gym.

Balloon Tap Race

Equipment : Balloon for each team,

Six teams lined up in shuttle relay style. Half of each team is lined up at one end of the gym and the other half at the the starting line at the opposite end of the gym.

Each half of each team decides on an order so everyone touches the balloon when tapping the ballon in the air, so everyone has an equal turn.

Partner Balloon Tap Race

Equipment : Balloon for each team

Six teams lined up in shuttle relay style. First two people on each team line up facing each other with one balloon between them. You may want to require the slide step while doing this.

Tap the balloon back and forth between each other until your feet cross the center line reach the center line. Then return back to your line by passing.

Pass the balloon to the next two people in line and the relay continues until everyone has had at least one turn. You could also set a limit of two to five minutes and see how many turns they can get.

“At every level, from the microcellular to the psychological, exercise not only wards off the ill effects of chronic stress; it can also reverse them. Studies show that if researchers exercise rats that have been chronically stressed, that activity makes the hippocampus grow back to its preshriveled state. The mechanisms by which exercise changes how we think and feel are so much more effective than donuts, medicines, and wine. When you say you feel less stressed out after you go for a swim, or even a fast walk, you are.”

you are born to move with grace, born to embrace novelty and variety, born to crave wide-open spaces, and, above all, born to love. But one of the more profound facts that will emerge is that you are born to heal. Your body fixes itself. A big part of this is an idea called homeostasis, which is a wonderfully intricate array of functions that repair the wear and tear and stress of living.” ― John J. Ratey, Go Wild: Free Your Body and Mind from the Afflictions of Civilization

“Cognitive flexibility is an important executive function that reflects our ability to shift thinking and to produce a steady flow of creative thoughts and answers as opposed to a regurgitation of the usual responses. The trait correlates with high-performance levels in intellectually demanding jobs. So if you have an important afternoon brainstorming session scheduled, going for a short, intense run during lunchtime is a smart idea.” ― John J. Ratey, Spark: The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain

“Today, of course, there’s no need to forage and hunt to survive. Yet our genes are coded for this activity, and our brains are meant to direct it. Take that activity away, and you’re disrupting a delicate biological balance that has been fine-tuned over half a million years. Quite simply, we need to engage our endurance metabolism to keep our bodies and brains in optimum condition. The ancient rhythms of activity ingrained in our DNA translate roughly to the varied intensity of walking, jogging, running, and sprinting. In broad strokes, then, I think the best advice is to follow our ancestors’ routine: walk or jog every day, run a couple of times a week, and then go for the kill every now and then by sprinting.” ― John J. Ratey, Spark: The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain

“about the biology of stress and recovery, stress seems to have an effect on the brain similar to that of vaccines on the immune system. In limited doses, it causes brain cells to overcompensate and thus gird themselves against future demands. Neuroscientists call this phenomenon stress inoculation.” ― John J. Ratey, Spark: The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain

“Scientists induced Parkinson’s in rats by killing the dopamine cells in their basal ganglia, and then forced half of them to run on a treadmill twice a day in the ten days following the “onset” of the disease. Incredibly, the runners’ dopamine levels stayed within normal ranges and their motor skills didn’t deteriorate. In one study on people with Parkinson’s, intensive activity improved motor ability as well as mood, and the positive effects lasted for at least six weeks after they stopped exercising.” ― John J. Ratey, Spark: The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain

“BORN TO RUN In his book Racing the Antelope: What Animals Can Teach Us about Running and Life, biologist Bernd Heinrich describes the human species as an endurance predator. The genes that govern our bodies today evolved hundreds of thousands of years ago, when we were in constant motion, either foraging for food or chasing antelope for hours and days across the plains. Heinrich describes how, even though antelope are among the fastest mammals, our ancestors were able to hunt them down by driving them to exhaustion—keeping on their tails until they had no energy left to escape. Antelope are sprinters, but their metabolism doesn’t allow them to go and go and go. Ours does. And we have a fairly balanced distribution of fast-twitch and slow-twitch muscle fibers, so even after ranging miles over the landscape we retain the metabolic capacity to sprint in short bursts to make the kill.” ― John J. Ratey, Spark: The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain

“A little is good, and more is better.” The best, however, based on everything I’ve read and seen, would be to do some form of aerobic activity six days a week, for forty-five minutes to an hour. Four of those days should be on the longer side, at moderate intensity, and two on the shorter side, at high intensity.” ― John J. Ratey, Spark: The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain

“The point to remember is that the issue is not nature versus nurture. It is the balance between nature and nurture. Genes do not make a man gay, or violent, or fat, or a leader. Genes merely make proteins. The chemical effect of these proteins may make the man’s brain and body more receptive to certain environmental influences. But the extent of those influences will have as much to do with the outcome as the genes themselves. Furthermore, we humans are not prisoners of our genes or our environment. We have free will. Genes are overruled every time an angry man restrains his temper, a fat man diets, and an alocholic refuses to take a drink. On the other hand, the environment is overruled every time a genetic effect wins out, as when Lou Gehrig’s athletic ability was overruled by his ALS. Genes and the environment work together to shape our brains, and we can manage them both if we want to. It may be harder for people with certain genes or surroundings, but “harder” is a long way from pedetermination.” ― John J. Ratey

Criss Cross Arms – Four counts – two with right arm top, then two with left

Hammer Fists – Eight Counts: two with right fist on top, then two with left

Hitch Hike – Eight Counts – two with right thumb, then two with left, two with right, two with left.

Twist 8 counts: Start the first two counts while you twist back and forth, then go lower for each two counts until you finish the final 2 counts about knee-high.

Repeat the steps above for two stanzas. Then for the rest of the song twist high, low, one foot, then the other.

Pumpkin Tag

Setup and Equipment:

Stuffed Halloween character work well instead of yarn balls.

Gym mat in front of each wall for a 3 second base.

In our gym we randomly choose one team, which is 4-6 people to be taggers

Guidelines:

Start up the Halloween music.

Taggers can toss or tag by tossing or tagging shoulders or below.

If a child is tagged, the child must freeze and sit down on the floor in a pumpkin shape (arm hugging his/her knees to the chest with one fist making a stem on his/her head).

In order to become “unfrozen,” any player that is not a “witch” must see the frozen pumpkin, and give their stem a fist bump to free them.

Zombie Tag:
Music: Halloween Favorites with the Simpson’s Halloween Special as transition music.

Setup and Equipment:

Stuffed Halloween characters or yarn balls to use as taggers.

One mat is set up in front of each wall – these are safe bases

Guidelines:

One team of 4-6 students is randomly chosen as “its” – they may throw (shoulders or below) or just tag players.

If they are tagged, they are turned into a zombie, they have to find another zombie, then make a bridge with their hands, then a 3rd zombie will walk under the bridge and all three of them will have “free walk backs to a mat.

Play continues for about two minutes while the Halloween music is played.

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